Spontly - Startacus interviews Jim Mann

So...I was at this fab wedding a few years back and we all had disposable cameras at our tables - my goodness there were some brilliant poses pulled. However, I never got to take a look at the pictures - in fact I can’t remember ever being at a wedding where anyone except the wedding couple get to take a look at the entire collection of photos taken. I wonder if there is an App for that?

And then there was that music festival I went to last week. I know I can see all of the pics that my friends shared on Facebook, but what if there was an App that shared every photo taken and highlighted the live action as it happened? An app that captured every single angle and perspective depending on who was taking the shots? And if you were a Music Festival organiser - would that not be a good way of live promoting your event and what you do for future promotional and marketing reference?

Well, we reckon we might have just found the App that does all of that. We chatted to Jim Mann from UK startup Spontly to find out more...

Jim - let’s start with yourself. If you could explain a little about your background and how your previous experience helped you come up with the idea for Spontly?

I’ve had a number of businesses and was working with a team trying to do something in the live event space. The further we got into it the more obvious it became that our business model was wrong, however we also discovered the problem that we are now fixing.

Give us your pitch - what is Spontly and what problem is it trying to solve?

We replace the disposable cameras that people used to use at weddings to try and get a 360-degree record of an event. We do this through an app that allows everyone who is in the same location to post pictures and comments to a shared album. We also make it really easy to publish the content from an event onto any website. It embeds like a You Tube video and updates as the event unfolds. This is really cool for concerts, sporting events and even conferences where the event organiser wants to restrict hashtag spamming but also wants a permanent record of the conversation and the conversation to occur on their website as well as the wider social sphere.

How many of you are in the Spontly team? And how has your startup headcount affected how quickly you can grow?

There are 9 of us now and we are starting to grow quite fast but we are always resource constrained. We have a long development list and are also live so we spend every free second promoting the business and selling our services. Whilst it’s frustrating at this stage for a long time there were just 2 of us, so it’s actually nice to be going this fast… but of course we always want to go faster.

In terms of the App development of Spontly itself - how did you find the process of 'idea' on paper for Spontly, to the end development of the App?

It was really tough to work out how to get started even once we knew there was demand. We are always learning and shaping the product, taking feedback from businesses and consumers and incorporating them into future builds. It’s weird to say but we still can’t love the product. We really struggle to see past the bits we don’t like, want to improve or have yet to be built. The whole idea to development cycle never ends.

Once you launched the App - how did it feel to see the App being downloaded by the public and also generating interest and sales from the business community?

I don’t remember feeling very much at all to be honest – it wasn’t a big launch or anything – we have always tried to be lean so we shipped early and as a consequence we are constantly updating our platform and apps. Every sale is exciting, watching the downloads and installs increase week by week is exciting – there is a real buzz here, we all share the wins and they keep coming – it’s a great place to be.

What's next? What plans do you have for Spontly going forward?

We don’t really release our future plans. There are a lot in the pipeline but clearly when you are growing fast, plans are always being fine tuned. There are some really exciting clients that we are working with which will be announced pretty soon and of course we want to expand outside of the UK before too long as well.

Good luck Jim and Spontly - we love this innovative wee App and look forward ot hearing more about it's future success!

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